Fall River medical districts discussed at neighborhood meeting

The city’s hospitals and medical providers need room to grow and the proposed medical districts would give them that, Mayor Will Flanagan told the Saint Anne’s Neighborhood Association Monday night.

By Kevin P. O’Connor

The Herald News, Fall River, MA

By Kevin P. O’Connor

Posted Apr. 2, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated Apr 2, 2013 at 2:13 AM

By Kevin P. O’Connor

Posted Apr. 2, 2013 at 12:01 AM
Updated Apr 2, 2013 at 2:13 AM

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The city’s hospitals and medical providers need room to grow and the proposed medical districts would give them that, Mayor Will Flanagan told the Saint Anne’s Neighborhood Association Monday night.

He urged those at the meeting to support the proposal when it comes to a public hearing later this month.

The city is proposing that the neighborhoods that contain Charlton Memorial Hospital, Saint Anne’s Hospital and the Prima Care complex be delineated as a special zoning district that would allow medical companies to expand there without the need of a zoning variance.

“The main goal for drafting the zone was, one, to spur economic activity in the city,” Flanagan said. “I sat down with the heads of the hospitals. We talked about ways to improve health care in Fall River and also to expand the economy.

“We talked about zoning and we discussed how we could use our waterfront zone as a model for a health care zone.”

In the Saint Anne’s neighborhood, the new medical zone would include several blocks in every direction from the hospital, up to Whipple Street on the east side of South Main Street and down to Dussault Street on the west side. It would run from Hamlet Street to Park Street on the east side of South Main Street and from Rockland Street to Kennedy Park on the west.

In that zone, medical facilities, doctor’s offices, research and development facilities and retail operations that serve the medical facilities would all be allowed to locate or expand without the need of zoning variance. They would have to meet existing building and safety codes, Flanagan said.

The neighborhood meeting was one of the first to introduce the plan to the city. Meetings are planned in all of the affected neighborhoods, officials said.

“We are very well aware people will have suggestions for this,” said City Planner Elizabeth Dennehy. “We will include suggestions in the final document. We are just getting started.”

People who own homes in those neighborhoods will hold grandfather rights to their zoning privileges, so they would still be able to make improvements to their property in accordance with the city’s building code, Dennehy said.

Flanagan noted that health care is now the city’s largest employment sector.

“Health care is leading the way,” he added. “That is where the jobs are being created.”

Al Lima, of Save Our Neighborhoods, asked city officials to slow the process, to allow time for more public input.

“Let’s go back to the drawing board and do this the right way this time and not just spring this on us,” Lima said.

The matter is up for two public hearings this month, both on April 23.

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The Planning Board will take up the matter in a public hearing at 4:30 p.m. in the first floor meeting room at Government Center. The City Council will hold a public hearing at 6 p.m. in its council chambers on the second floor.

Dennehy asked those with concerns to call or write her office before the public hearings. Both she and Flanagan said they expect the proposal to be amended before it is passed.

“We want this to be a cooperative process,” he said. “At the end of the day, it really depends on what you all want.”